Anyone who doubts the mainstreaming of the cannabis industry might want to skip "Letterman" and check out "Cannabis Planet." The weekly program, premiering in the Bay Area at midnight Friday on KOFY-TV, intends to promote the benefits of marijuana, but viewers shouldn't tune in expecting "KOFY and Bong Hits."

The show is structured around a pair of cannabis news anchors (yes, one of them has dreadlocks) and a mashup of educational segments, such as cooking demonstrations for hemp smoothies and medicated chicken stir-fry, and cannabis cultivation tips with marijuana guru Ed Rosenthal.

Lane pays KOFY to put "Cannabis Planet" on the air, like an infomercial, and generates revenue by running ads during the show for companies that produce grow lights, plant food and other products geared toward the cannabis industry. His operational philosophy is "Fuel, food, fiber, medicine," and he's bent on showing the public that medical marijuana isn't just for those with serious illnesses. He claims cannabis can alleviate everything from menstrual cramps to sleep disorders, and personally uses marijuana to curb attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, from which he's suffered since his days in Montessori school.

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"When other children laid down to take naps, I was instructed to go outside and run laps," he says. "But I'm lucky I have this energy because I work 18 hours a day producing this show. Wherever it says that cannabis is a motivation killer, I think I'm living proof that that's not true."

Second season

KJLA-TV, which reaches most of Southern California, first aired the Los Angeles-based show in July of last year and is now presenting season two to roughly 40,000 viewers each week. KOFY picked up "Cannabis Planet" after contacting KJLA-TV, whose executives vouched for Lane and said he hadn't brought them any trouble from the FCC. KOFY reviews all the show's content and reserves the right to pull it off the air in its entirety, but does not make edits or changes. The station is in for 26 episodes and will run a disclaimer each week, but Craig Coane, KOFY's president and general manager, isn't wringing his hands over the content.

"We support 'Cannabis Planet's' right to educate and inform the public about medical marijuana," Coane says. The station will run promo ads for the show, but Coane won't predict how many people will tune in. "We don't know what to expect because it's unlike any other program I've seen."

"Cannabis Planet" hits the Bay Area at a time when local medical marijuana advocates are divided over how best to push the agenda of full, statewide legalization. Richard Lee, founder of the pioneering cannabis collegeOaksterdam University in Oakland is sponsoring an initiative to tax and regulate marijuana across the state. He recently turned in more than 700,000 signatures backing the measure to county voter registries, making its place on the forthcoming November ballot all but certain. Rallying political support for legalization during an election year, however, could be difficult, and some legalization advocates believe the new ballot measure is too restrictive.

Lee says that he would like a less restrictive measure but that right now it's "not politically feasible."

Peron, who recently taped an interview for a forthcoming episode of "Cannabis Planet," calls marijuana the most important medicine in the world, "right up there with penicillin," and says more people need to start looking at it that way.

"We've had 50 years of propaganda against marijuana," he says, "so it's good that there's a show."

Fuels medical debate

If viewers indeed tune in, "Cannabis Planet" will probably add fuel to the debate over the legitimacy of marijuana as medicine. Anti-drug activists like Calvina Fay, director of the Drug Free America Foundation in Florida, say the science behind medical marijuana is agenda-driven and based on anecdotal evidence.

"When people are truly sick and dying, they deserve the best medicine, and marijuana has not shown to be that," she says.

Fay, who is aware of the show but says she hasn't seen it, has criticized the promotion of medical marijuana on TV as dangerous and irresponsible. "If they're going to extol the virtues of marijuana as medicine, they have an obligation to show the harm of marijuana. It's been linked to schizophrenia and other problems. It's more cancer-causing than cigarettes."

Peron dismisses such statements as "prohibitionist reefer madness," and Lee wonders why anti-drug groups aren't complaining about beer commercials that target young people during sports programming.

Lane says Fay is welcome to appear on "Cannabis Planet" for an open debate, but she dismisses the invitation.

"The foundation would not participate in it," she says. "I don't see it as a legitimate show, so it would be a waste of our time."

Legitimacy, though, is exactly what Lane is striving for. Next month, "Cannabis Planet" is sponsoring a vehicle in NASCAR's K&N Series, where the first medical-cannabis car will race alongside cars sponsored by alcohol, tobacco and pharmaceutical companies.

Key to Lane's goal of developing mainstream partnerships is making sure that every aspect of his show's production complies with state and local marijuana laws.

"I don't have any legal concerns because I'm not doing anything illegal," he says. "But I'm sure law enforcement is looking at this show with some intrigue."